Which Stars Were Hit Hardest by the Great Instagram Purge of 2014?

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Instagram


The great Instagram
purge of 2014 hit hard, and no stars were left unscathed.

On Thursday, Instagram followed through with their promise to delete fake accounts. These included Instagram handles that were used to post spam, or were purchased to boost the number of followers some Instagrammers needed in order to claim that they had significant influence.

It didn't take long to see that the mass deletion of fake accounts took a real toll. Rapper Ma$e lost over 1.5 million followers, dropping from over 1.6 million to just 272,000 overnight. In response to the harsh criticism from people on the internet mocking the artist, Ma$e deleted his entire account.


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While he was hit hard, it was nothing compared to the losses a number of other massive celebs felt. The website 64px cataloged the 100 Instagram accounts with the largest followings the night before the purge, and then looked back to see who had lost the most. Some of the results were pretty shocking. Here are a few highlights.


Justin Bieber: 
The "Baby" singer had more Instagram followers than any other celeb before the reckoning, with 23.8 million, followed closely by Kim Kardashian. Then, he lost a whopping 3.5 million followers overnight. Now Kim Kardashian (who lost 1.3 million) and Beyonce (who lost 831,000) both have larger audiences.


The Million+ Club: 
Eleven Instagram accounts from the Top 100 list lost over 1 million followers. Aside from those mentioned above, the unfortunate club also includes Rihanna, Sean Diddy Combs, Selena Gomez and Ariana Grande. Meanwhile, rapper Akon lost 2.4 million.


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Instagram Takes the Top Spot:
 Instagram itself had over 64.1 million followers before the purge, and lost 18.8 million after all was said and done. However, it was a result they had to expect.


Non-Celebs Get Hit:
 Wellington Campos, whose entire Instagram is filled with photos of Woody from Toy Story doing funny, weird things, was the most famous non-celeb on Instagram with 5.5 million followers before judgment day. In the mass deletion, he lost 2.2 million followers, meaning a loss of 59.6%. Which, to be fair, is only slightly worse than Akon's loss of 56.2%


R.I.P. ChiragChirag78
– An Instagram user named ChiragChirag78 was 97th on the Top 100, with 3,660,468 followers. After the dust settled, the account was left with eight. Eight followers were all that remained after the fake account was terminated - a loss of 99.9998%. ChiragChirag78's Instagram no longer exists.


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Nails, Nails, Nails:
 Of the Top 100, one account fared the best over all others: Nailsvideos. It's an Instagram page that shares thousands of close-up videos of beautifully decorated fingernails. The account didn't go totally unscathed - as they lost 23,000 followers from their original 3.6 million - but that's only a 0.64% decrease, making them the big winners of the purge.


Final Stats:
Of the Top 100, the average Instagrammer lost 671,786 followers (a number likely inflated by Instagram's loss of 18 million and Bieber's loss of 3.5 million). Meanwhile, the average drop was 7.6653%.

While a lot of these celebs might be feeling a little angry at Instagram right now, comedian Chelsea Handler was slamming the social media platform back in October after they removed a topless photo she posted. Check out the video below for more on that Instadrama.

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